At the beginning of this writing journey, I shared with you that I was leading a women's small group Bible Study at church.
I had so many reservations about doing this, not the least of which, was my view of myself as
completely unqualified to be any kind of "teacher/facilitator/leader."
I'm happy to say that I'm glad I did it {translation: so far, so good}.
I'm also glad that I seem to be learning as much, maybe more, than the other ladies in the study.
I feel very comfortable with the entire group and have had no issue admitting to them when I struggled with some of the material or homework.
The subject matter is pretty heavy - it's called Divine Design and it's all about God's divine design for womanhood {with a brief week spent on men and how/why He created them}.
That week on men on was pretty breezy. I found myself nodding and saying, "yes, that's my husband, alright!" or "yeah, maybe I need to read this to him!"
Then we got to last week's material: not only HOW God created woman, but WHY He made us softer, more emotional, more bent towards relationship and bonding, etc.
Some of the information was truly a new discovery; not because I'd never heard it before, but because it was presented in a way that I had never thought of.
Some of the information was quite convicting.
I've never been disillusioned enough to think that I am a perfect wife, but after last week's Bible passages and corresponding "homework," I worry that I'm not nearly the "helper" to my husband that God intended me to be.
It gave me lots to think about and made me realize I have much room to improve.
The benefit, though, is seeing how truly DIVINE God's plan was for man and woman and the Holy union of marriage.
The realization that He created the marriage relationship as a parallel to the relationship between Christ and the church was a big one for me. It makes me feel rightfully convicted over my shortcomings as a wife, but hopeful too.
If God put so much thought ahead of time into the creation of man and wife as well as the union of marriage, He knew ahead of time there would be struggles. He gives us what we need to persevere when we trust Him. Learning about the traits He assigned to each gender and knowing how well they offset each other lets me know that there is so much room to grow in my marriage.
One of the ideas covered in the study this past week states it well {paraphrased}:
Gods intention wasn't that we COMPETE with each in marriage, but that we COMPLETE each other in marriage.
I can't think of anything more fulfilling as a wife than to feel like I COMPLETE my husband and have him feel the same.
No comments:
Post a Comment